For full article, click the linked title:

• Questions to ask yourself when plotting a story
• Establish stakes 
• Utilize Chekhov’s gun
• Avoid card tricks in the dark 
• Watch consistency errors 
• Avoid handwaving to cover a story flaw
• Delete bogus alternatives
• Eliminate ambiguities

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My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past 15 years, I’ve helped more than 400 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the Storytelling 101 writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.

Check out some of my guidebooks for plotting your story:

Suffering from writer’s block or need to add some spunk to your writing? The problem may be that you need to change up your routine.

To that end, try this tip: One way to come up with a gift idea is to observe what the recipient is missing in his home. What are you missing in your writing? Does your book need a description of a character’s physical appearance? An apt simile? An exciting exchange of dialogue? Spend your writing session giving yourself a gift by penning the missing part of your book.

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My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past 15 years, I’ve helped more than 400 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the Storytelling 101 writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.

Check out some of my writing guidebooks:

I wouldn’t make up this: Apparently people who’ve been applying makeup all of their lives don’t know how to spell what they’re putting on their face! Time for a makeup study session on this.

How the word is spelled really centers on what part of a speech it is in a sentence.

If a verb, it’s two words (“make up”) as in “You can make up the test after school.”

If a noun or adjective, it’s one word, no hyphen (“makeup”). To wit, “She purchased makeup at the cosmetics counter” (noun) and “Are you ready to take your makeup test?” (adjective).

Now you’re already to take that grammar test!

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My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past 15 years, I’ve helped more than 350 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the 7 Minutes a Day… writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.

Check out some of my self-publishing guidebooks:

Of course, sometimes exposition is necessary for expediency’s sake. But it should appear sparingly. A quick sentence noting some historical event or a common trait of an alien species is fine. After all, on that rare occasion, showing rather than telling would add far too much length to a story. If falling into this situation, remember to only include just the amount of exposition that is needed to move the story forward.

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My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past decade, I’ve helped more than 400 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the Storytelling 101 writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.

Check out some of my writing guidebooks:

“A writer never has a vacation. For a writer life consists of either writing or thinking about writing.” – Eugene Ionesco

“You may be able to take a break from writing, but you won’t be able to take a break from being a writer…” – Stephen Leigh

“You know what it means – you’re a writer and you understand it. It’s not just ‘the satisfaction of being published.’ Great God! It’s the satisfaction of getting it out, or having that, so far as you’re concerned, gone through with it! That good or ill, for better or for worse, it’s over, done with, finished, out of your life forever and that, come what may, you can at least, as far as this thing is concerned, get the merciful damned easement of oblivion and forgetfulness.” – Tom Wolfe

“I count it a high honor to belong to a profession in which the good men write every paragraph, every sentence, every line, as lovingly as any Addison or Steele, and do so in full regard that by tomorrow it will have been burned, or used, if at all, to line a shelf.” – Alexander Woollcott

“I never want to see anyone, and I never want to go anywhere or do anything. I just want to write.” – P. G. Wodehouse

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My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past 15 years, I’ve helped more than 400 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the Storytelling 101 writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.

Check out some of my writing guidebooks:

“Writing is a dog’s life, but the only one worth living.” – Gustave Flaubert

“You are what you write.” – Helvy Tiana Rosa

“I can shake off everything as I write; my sorrows disappear, my courage is reborn.” – Anne Frank

“I don’t have to live in the real world — I’m a fiction writer.” – Aaron Sorkin

“Seeing your name on the book cover is like hearing your book saying, ‘Hi. Thanks for writing me!’” – Syahrin

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My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past 15 years, I’ve helped more than 400 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the Storytelling 101 writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.

Check out some of my writing guidebooks:

If your writing feels vanilla, the likely problem with your novel or short story is that it shows rather then tells. Just what does that mean exactly, and how can you fix it? Here are seven great tips for tackling show don’t tell problems in your writing. Click the linked title for the full article:

• Show, don’t tell when writing fiction
Want to slow your story to a glacial grind and get readers to quit reading your story? Then load it with lots of exposition. Problems arising with exposition often (and rightfully) elicit cries of “Show, don’t tell!” from editors.

• How to make your writing show rather than tell

• Show rather than tell a character’s personality

• Create successful story by staging it

• Opt for scene over summary when writing stories

• Show rather than tell the backstory
Among the major errors some novice writers make is waiting to tell readers a story. Those writers begin their tale with lots of background information, such as the main character’s personality, where that character lives, what she does for a job, who are the members of her family, and so on. They believe that readers need to know this information before the story can be told.

• Embedding exposition into your story  

______________________

My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past decade, I’ve helped more than 400 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the Storytelling 101 writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.

Check out some of my writing guidebooks:

• Never be afraid to write what you believe. If the message speaks the truth, others will fear you. 
When you’re afraid how others will react to your writing, you’ve allowed them to define you. Should you write only what others find acceptable, you’ve allowed them to control you. You’ve given their values a higher priority than your own tastes and standards. As you writer, you cannot care what others will think of you or your writing.

• Don’t burden us with a self-indulgent digression 

• Utilize milepost character to critique concepts

• Layer story’s imagery with symbolic meaning 

• Place Easter egg to reward careful readers 

• Include clever in-jokes by tuckerizing 

• Challenge yourself to write ‘dramables’ 

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My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past 15 years, I’ve helped more than 400 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the Storytelling 101 writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.

Check out some of my writing guidebooks:

Have another person read a manuscript that you have been working on for some time. Use their advice to revise the piece.

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My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past 15 years, I’ve helped more than 400 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the Storytelling 101 writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.

Check out some of my writing guidebooks: